Singapore parenting, practical reviews and tech notes

So What Happened to Tupperware Singapore and My Tupperware Warranty?

Tupperware Distributor

Disclaimer

Before I begin, I want to state clearly that everything I write here is based on my own perspective, investigation, and the facts I have been able to obtain. The only official communication I personally received from Tupperware regarding the changes in Singapore was an email dated 13 December 2024 from the Commercial Director for Singapore and Malaysia. I will reference parts of that email but not share it in its entirety. This post is meant to document my journey and provide some answers to customers, partners, and anyone following Tupperware’s recent story.

My Background

I have proudly represented Tupperware as a distributor in Singapore for over a decade. Over those years, I managed a successful e-commerce business focused solely on Tupperware products. I’ve always felt part of a community that values quality, innovation, and a shared entrepreneurial spirit.

The Sudden News

On 13 December 2024, while on holiday with my family, I received an email with the subject “Closure of Tupperware Singapore.” It felt like a punch to the gut—especially as there hadn’t been any hint of such drastic action. The email announced that Tupperware would “discontinue activities and phase out our business operations in your area” with immediate effect. All sales, order entry, and distribution were to be stopped at once, and we were required to cease using all Tupperware intellectual property—including the logo and catalogue images—immediately.

Not only was this abrupt, but it also left the sales force in the lurch, with no practical support for handling ending operations.

Struggling for Answers

The email named a Division Sales Manager, “N”, as our go-to for “any queries, next steps, and available support.” However, my own attempts to reach out were met with silence. Understandably, “N” may have been overwhelmed by the sheer volume of questions and the magnitude of the news. I, like many, was left with more questions than answers.

Sales Force Left with Stock and No Support

What struck me hardest was the lack of empathy for the sales force like myself. The directive to immediately cease using all Tupperware branding was clear, but there was little consideration of the stock—purchased with our own savings—that many of us now had on hand. There was no word about buy-backs, compensation, or even advice on how to sell through this inventory, especially when we could no longer publicly use the Tupperware name or images.

The Warranty Black Hole

Unsurprisingly, after the shutdown, countless customers contacted me for clarity about their Tupperware warranties—long seen as a cornerstone of the brand’s reputation. I’m sorry to say that I have not received any official word from Tupperware about honouring or continuing Singaporean customers’ warranty claims after the market’s closure. I can only confirm that the Singapore-based Service Centre closed shortly after the email announcement.

The Business Impact—And How I’m Coping

As a business owner, I have been badly affected. Not only am I left with an inventory of stock I may not be able to move, but there has also been no opportunity to continue making my side income. The wider Tupperware community in Singapore feels abandoned and anxious about the future.

Why Did This Happen? The Global Picture

Tupperware has faced mounting financial difficulties for years. Once a household name synonymous with home parties and durable kitchenware, the company has struggled with debt, changing consumer habits, and the shift towards digital shopping. In 2023, global headlines reported Tupperware facing the risk of bankruptcy as it scrambled to renegotiate its loans and secure new sources of funding. In 2024, its main creditor group effectively took over, forcing the company into a wide-ranging restructuring.

Part of that restructuring involved closing down many international markets—including Singapore, where operations officially ended in December 2024. Other regions in Asia, as well as parts of Europe and Africa, have also seen Tupperware withdraw completely or scale down operations.

Where Is Tupperware Still Active?

After these mass closures, Tupperware’s main operations seem focused on a handful of core markets:

  • United States
  • Canada
  • Mexico
  • Brazil
  • China
  • Korea
  • India
  • Malaysia

In Closing

I wish there were more closure—for myself and for my customers—after so many years of loyal partnership. To everyone who reached out with support, questions, or simply to share the sense of shock, thank you. If new information or official guidance comes in, I will update this post and my website.

 

Why I Built a Hanzi-to-Pinyin Converter

Howard Toh

As someone who grew up speaking Mandarin, I’ve always felt at home with the language—but even I find myself pausing over a tricky character once in a while. Whether it’s a word I haven’t seen since childhood, an unfamiliar lyric in a Chinese song, or a classic text that’s just outside my everyday vocabulary, it’s surprisingly easy to get stuck and wish for an instant pinyin “cheat sheet.” I realized I wasn’t alone—many friends and family members, whether they’re fluent speakers, second-generation learners, or just curious about Chinese, have run into the same challenge.

With that in mind, I decided to build a Hanzi-to-Pinyin converter that makes this process fast, accurate, and visually clear. My aim was to help people at every stage: native speakers needing an occasional prompt; parents and teachers supporting children; heritage speakers reconnecting with their roots; and of course anyone studying Mandarin from scratch. The ability to quickly see the pinyin for any Chinese text—be it a message, a poem, or the lines of a catchy tune—removes a little friction and opens up all kinds of learning moments.

One of the most interesting technical challenges came from polyphonic characters: those Hanzi with more than one possible pronunciation depending on their context. Right now, the tool uses the most common reading for each character, which covers most everyday situations. This makes things simple and effective the majority of the time. However, truly nailing the right pronunciation every time—especially for those characters that shift depending on surrounding words or grammatical function—would require a much deeper level of language understanding. That’s something I’d love to tackle in the future, probably by leveraging advances in natural language processing to bring in real contextual awareness.

For now, I’ve focused on reliability, straightforward presentation, and catering to a wide range of users. The converter is easy to use, with results lined up clearly so you can scan both the Hanzi and Pinyin at a glance. It’s already been a big help in my own reading and teaching, and I hope it proves just as useful for anyone who loves Chinese or wants to strengthen their skills.

Who Benefits?

  • Parents teaching children:
    See every pronunciation for each Hanzi, verify tone and reading, and use the grid layout for interactive reading time.
  • Language learners:
    Never get stumped by a multi-pronunciation character again. The tool’s interface makes advanced reading and self-study a breeze.
  • Mandarin music fans:
    Match every lyric—line-by-line, word-by-word—no more missed rhymes or confusion during your sing-along.

Try It Now!

Experience the future of Hanzi-to-Pinyin conversion at nric.biz/chinese-to-pinyin-converter.php. Feel free to share your feedback and help shape the next generation of Mandarin learning!

Originally posted on fated.net.
Tool available at: https://nric.biz/chinese-to-pinyin-converter.php

When Old Melodies Meet: Mixing 張洪量’s Classics

Howard Toh

Discovering a Familiar Sound

Recently, as I was listening to 張洪量’s “心爱妹妹的眼睛,” something about the melody struck me as oddly familiar. I couldn’t shake the feeling that I’d heard those chords before, and after a few repeats, it finally clicked—the chord progression was the same as another 张洪量 classic, “你知道我在等你吗.”

Both songs have that signature C–Am–F–G chord progression running through most of their verses and choruses. It’s a classic progression, but I was surprised at how closely the two songs mirrored each other, not just in mood but also in musical structure.

A Mashup Idea Is Born

Once I noticed this, I was curious: what if these two songs weren’t just similar, but actually mixed together? Could I blend their vocals or melodies and make them feel like a single new song?

So I decided to give it a go. I fired up GarageBand, brought in both tracks, and started tinkering. There was one big difference between the two: “心爱妹妹的眼睛” is noticeably slower than “你知道我在等你吗.” To get them to fit together, I had to adjust the tempo of “心爱妹妹的眼睛” so it would match up rhythmically. With a bit of slicing, synchronizing, and some patience, the mix began to take shape.

The Mixing Process

I used the instrumental/backing track from “你知道我在等你吗” as the foundation, then overlaid elements from “心爱妹妹的眼睛.” Surprisingly, everything fit together beautifully once the tempos were synced. The magic of a shared chord progression brought the melodies together smoothly, and I was able to create a blend that retained the spirit of both originals.

What I love most about this experiment is how it highlights the underlying connections in music—sometimes, songs we think are completely different are actually built on the same musical foundations. All it takes is a bit of curiosity (and maybe a DAW like GarageBand) to uncover those links.

Listen and Let Me Know Your Thoughts!

I put the finished mashup on YouTube for fun. If you’re a 張洪量 fan, or just enjoy clever musical experiments, give it a listen! I’d love to hear what you think, and whether you know of other songs that secretly share the same DNA.

I did a 5-day water fast with daily blood glucose and ketones measurements

Howard Toh

I have been on Intermittent Fasting (IF) for over a year and I gradually increased my IF from 16/8 to 18/6, 20/4 and sometimes reaching 24 or 25 hours without food. There are so many resources on the web on the benefits of IF such as reversing insulin resistance, weight loss (because one tends to eat lesser with IF and creates a sustainable calorie deficit) and many more.

However, to get some of the better benefits such as fat burn (ketosis) and autophagy, a fast that is beyond 24 hours is required. This is because you may already spend 24-48 hours depleting your glycogen store in your liver and muscle before you can enter ketosis. This is the time that autophagy can also begin. While on a keto diet or IF, one tends to drink black tea / coffee but that is thought to interrupt the autophagy process by stimulating insulin response. As such, I planned to be extremely strict on my 5-day water fast – nothing except plain water.

I started on Sunday, 28 November 2021 at 6:30pm – that is the time I swallowed my last bite of dinner. I at like there was no tomorrow. As a result, I weighed in at 90.45KG that night. Although I started on Sunday 6:30pm and is to break my fast at the same time on the following Friday, let’s take Monday as Day 1 for simplicity.

I bought a tube of ketone urine test strips in advance but I gave it some thought and felt that I should invest in a more precise data collection since I’ll be committing so much to this 5-day fast. It would be a waste if I had to fall back on test strip indicators that are subjective. I will then use Glucose-Ketones-Index (GKI) to see how am I doing in terms of ketosis.

What is GKI (Glucose Ketones Index)

Day 1

I went out to grab blood glucose and ketones strips for my Abbott Freestyle Optium Neo Blood Glucose & Ketones Monitoring System

  • Mood: Totally fine – this is within my usual IF practice anyway
  • Energy level: Great
  • Mental clarity: good
  • Blood Glucose: 4.8 mmol/L
  • Blood Ketones: 0.3 mmol/L
  • GKI: 16 (Not in ketosis)
  • Weight: 88.75 kg
  • Remarks: My body has yet to fully use up the glycogen store due to my high carb meal the day before. I expect this to be depleted within the next 12-24 hours.

Day 2

  • Mood: A little grumpy
  • Energy level: A little lesser than normal
  • Mental clarity: good
  • Blood Glucose: 3.6 mmol/L
  • Blood Ketones: 2.1 mmol/L
  • GKI: 1.7 (Therapeutic ketosis)
  • Weight: 88.25 kg
  • Remarks: I jumped straight into ketosis. The hunger was okay but my mind is

Day 3

  • Mood: neutral
  • Energy level: it’s alright
  • Mental clarity: good
  • Blood Glucose: 3.2 mmol/L
  • Blood Ketones: 3.6 mmol/L
  • GKI: 0.9  (Highest therapeutic ketosis)
  • Weight: 87.2 kg
  • Remarks: Technically hypoglycaemic if based purely on blood glucose level. However, I am burning fats and ketones so this level of glucose is still safe. The body is using protein to produce the little bit of glucose needed by certain parts of the body that cannot burn fat/ketones.

Day 4

  • Mood: grumpy
  • Energy level: lower than usual
  • Mental clarity: great
  • Blood Glucose: 3.3 mmol/L
  • Blood Ketones: 4.7 mmol/L
  • GKI: 0.7  (Highest therapeutic ketosis)
  • Weight: 86.75 kg
  • Remarks: I can’t take my mind of food. Every time I open FB/IG, someone is posting about food they bought / eating or how-to style videos about preparing food. I went into Grab app and attempted to schedule some deliveries for the next day ….

Day 5

  • Mood: surreal
  • Energy level: lower than usual
  • Mental clarity: great
  • Blood Glucose: 3.1 mmol/L
  • Blood Ketones: 6.2 mmol/L
  • GKI: 0.5  (Highest therapeutic ketosis)
  • Weight: 85.4 kg
  • Remarks: I walked for about 2.4km to run errands (Grab groceries and such for my breaking of fast). Because of that exertion, I hit an all time high of 6.2 mmol/L of ketones and 3.1 mmol/L of glucose.

Data Collected

May be an image of text that says "Howard's Ketones, Glucose & GKI Ketones (mmol/L) 8 16 Glucose (mmol/L) GKI 6 4.8 20 3.6 6.2 4.7 3.6 3.2 15 2 2.1 3.3 0.3 1.7 3.1 10 0 29/11/2021 0.9 30/11/2021 0.7 5 01/12/2021 0.5 02/12/2021 Date 0 03/12/2021"

May be an image of text that says "Howard's weight, body fat and muscle mass Weight (KG) 100 90.45 88.85 Body Fat (KG) 88.75 80 Muscle Mass (KG) 88.25 87.5 87.2 60 86.75 58.20 86.05 85.4 58. FI 57.90 40 28:76 57.90 PM 57.70 58.20 27.45 26.89 20 28/11 pm 26.92 26.43 26.16 29/11 pm 25.94 1/12 am 24.70 24.77 2/12 am 3/12pm pm"

My final blood glucose and ketones blood test on Day 5

Conclusion

As you can see, despite not eating for 5 days, my blood glucose level did not drop below 3 (which would have been dangerous). This is no coincidence as the body just produces enough glucose to keep some parts of my body functioning while the bulk of my body ran on fats and ketones. Will I do it again? Yes – twice a year. There is no need to go on a 5-day fast that often. However, I am contemplating going on a weekly 48-hour fast on top of my IF.

A word of warning: if you are diabetic, please consult a doctor first because instead of ketosis, you can slip into ketoacidosis which is potentially life threatening!

 

Why I took Moderna for my booster after 2 Pfizer shots

Howard Toh

Disclaimer: This should not be taken as medical advice as I am just sharing my experience as someone who had taken 2 Pfizer shots and decided to take Moderna as my booster.

I had my first and second vaccinations back in March and April 2021 and that made me eligible for my booster yesterday (19 October). I made the conscious effort to “mix” vaccines by going for Moderna even if it meant that I had to travel slightly further to a vaccination centre that carries Moderna when there’s already a Pfizer vaccination centre within a 5-minute walk from my home. I am also aware of the generally worse side effects based on anecdotal accounts from Moderna recipients.

So why did I still choose to bring this upon myself?

First of all, I have no doubt that Pfizer and Moderna are both great mRNA vaccines. They both greatly reduce the chances that one will get hospitalised due to severe symptoms from Covid-19. However, in the recent months, there has been early reports that Moderna is more effective than Pfizer against the Delta variant.

In a study of more than 50,000 patients in the Mayo Clinic Health System, researchers found that the effectiveness of Moderna’s vaccine against infection had dropped to 76 per cent last month – when the Delta variant was predominant – from 86 per cent early this year.

Over the same period, the effectiveness of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine had fallen to 42 per cent from 76 per cent, researchers said.

Source: https://www.straitstimes.com/world/united-states/moderna-may-be-superior-to-pfizer-against-delta

Historically, there were findings of vaccine mixing (heterologous prime-boost) could be more immunogenic than single vaccines (homologous prime-boost). While such a study has yet to be conducted on a Pfizer-Moderna combination, authorities around the world have begun allowing mixing of vaccines to ease the burden on logistics and supplies.

In Singapore, our authorities view mRNA vaccines as “similar” and have therefore officially allowed the mix as of 17 September 2021.

Source: https://sg.news.yahoo.com/covid-booster-pfizer-biontech-moderna-vaccine-134827443.html

Side effects of mixing Pfizer and Moderna Vaccines

Before going for the booster shot, I tried searching for side effects of mixing the two vaccines but without success. So here’s my account of the 36 hours post vaccination:

19 October 2021

9:30am: I arrived at the vaccination site ahead of my 10am appointment. I was made to acknowledge that I am switching from Pfizer to Moderna – twice. Once at the registration counter and then at the vaccination booth.

9:36am: Vaccination done. Time for the 30-minute on-site observation.

10:06am: Called to the discharge counter to check if I’m okay. All good. I then took a 4km casual walk home (strenuous exercise is not allowed so I made sure that it was a casual stroll).

I technically had the day off from work (vaccination benefit) so I chilled for the most part of the afternoon.

4pm: Short nap – no fever yet.

6pm: Felt a bit lethargic. No fever yet. Unable to get up to send my daughter for her piano class.

7pm: Got up for dinner. No fever yet. Realised that there’s some work to be done.

8pm: Slight fever at 37.9 C.

10pm: Fever at 38.5 C.

11pm: Fever at 39 C, chills kicking in. This continued through the night.

20 October 2021

7am: A lot of pressure on my entire face – like it’s going to explode. I could barely wake my kids up for school. Temp: 38.9 C.

3pm: I only got up at 3pm and temperature was 38.1 C. Attended a few meetings and left home to get my medical leave to cover my absence for the good part of the work day.

7pm: Temperature at 37.6 C (Might be the paracetamol that I finally took)

10pm: Temperature 38.4 C + chills. Here we go again.

I’ll update this post until I’ve stopped experiencing any effects of the vaccination.

Conclusion about mixing Pfizer / Moderna for booster shot

It has always been anecdotally known that Moderna recipients suffer longer  fevers, headaches and chills compared to Pfizer recipients. This is why I am not at all surprised if my symptoms is going to go on for another day or two. This is within my expectation and I made that informed choice.

Should you mix vaccines? My personal opinion is yes. Mixing vaccines could potentially offer a wider spectrum of coverage. Even if it does not offer significant benefits, there should not be any ill effects of mixing the vaccines otherwise this practice would have been banned around the world. At the end of the day, this is your personal choice. Mixing or not, just get your 2 +1 vaccinations done!